I could not bear the bees should come,
I wished they 'd stay away
In those dim countries where they go:
What word had they for me?
They 're here, though; not a creature failed,
No blossom stayed away
In gentle deference to me,
The Queen of Calvary.
Each one salutes me as he goes,
And I my childish plumes
Lift, in bereaved acknowledgment
Of their unthinking drums.
XV.
THE HUMMING-BIRD.
A route of evanescence
With a revolving wheel;
A resonance of emerald,
A rush of cochineal;
And every blossom on the bush
Adjusts its tumbled head, —
The mail from Tunis, probably,
An easy morning's ride.
XVI.
SECRETS.
The skies can't keep their secret!
They tell it to the hills —
The hills just tell the orchards —
And they the daffodils!
A bird, by chance, that goes that way
Soft overheard the whole.
If I should bribe the little bird,
Who knows but she would tell?